Roundup: No need for a turf war

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The possibility of committee allocations in the Senate turning into a turf war is something that I’m not sure is an imminent issue, but Kady O’Malley nevertheless faithfully explores in her weekend column, including some potential procedural manoeuvres that Senator Peter Harder could attempt to employ to force the modernization committee report to come to fruition as government business (which it currently is not), but as is not unexpected, she got some pushback from Senator Leo Housakos.

Just to add my own two cents, I have indeed heard some concerns from both the Conservatives and Senate Liberals that the Non-Aligned Senators have not yet been able to fill their committee spots, which may also have been why Senator Peter Harder has been organizing to “help” the new independent senators out, essentially big footing the efforts of the Independent Senators Group, but one has to add that they’re building their own processes and organization from scratch.

So we’ll see. I still think that the newly appointed 21 senators shouldn’t be in any hurry to get committee spots, but take the time to get adjusted to their new environment as the committees are currently operating okay and we aren’t seeing a lot of cases where senators are doing triple duty just to keep committees filled (as was the case with the Conservatives pre-2008, when Harper was obstinately refusing to fill seats the first time around). And as I’ve said previously, they can spend some time participating in committees as they have the right to now – they just can’t be voting members, which is probably just as well in terms of getting them acquainted to the place. So everyone should relax because there is no actual crisis.

Good reads:

  • The head of SIRC thinks that CSIS was keeping that metadata in good faith and that its head shouldn’t lose his job as Goodale is hinting. (More about the ruling here.)
  • Ontario’s former privacy commissioner says that metadata needs to be deleted.
  • Marc Garneau says that West Coast crude tanker ban is coming soon.
  • Irwin Cotler says the government should leverage its arms sales to Saudi Arabia to free blogger Raif Badawi from jail and bring him to Canada.
  • Maryam Monsef say she doesn’t like referenda but may accept it if that’s what the committee recommends unanimously (and good luck with that).
  • The EU ambassador to Canada said that Chrystia Freeland walking out of the talks in Belgium was the right thing to do.
  • Documents show that the government may be looking at offering pardons for LGBT individuals persecuted by the government, but may not offer compensation.
  • Here’s a look at a meeting that a Liberal MP organized with Iranian groups about re-engaging with that country.
  • Lisa Raitt dislikes carbon taxes and likes economic immigrants.
  • Leadership also-rans Dan Lindsay and Andrew Saxton will be at the Saskatoon debate next week, for what good it will do.
  • Stephanie Carvin notes there is little oversight of intelligence analysis in this country, and offers some thoughts on the national security review.
  • Susan Delacourt compares some of the electoral discontent in Canada and the US.

Odds and ends:

Bruce Carson was fined $50,000 for illegal lobbying, and given five years to pay it. The penalty was to send a message of deterrence.

Over in the Law Times, I look at changes to judicial appointments and how that affects delays in the system.